Why Taylor Swift Is Comfortable Singing — but Not Talking — About Her Relationship with Joe Alwyn
Taylor Swift keeps her relationship with Joe Alwyn under wraps, but that doesn’t mean she won’t sing about him.
The couple has been dating for almost three years, and Swift’s romance with Alwyn, 28, inspired many of the lyrics within Lover, Swift’s seventh studio album that dropped last month.
In the Target special edition of her album, the star also confirmed in a diary entry that the two began secretly dating in the fall of 2016.
In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, the 29-year-old musician explained that she feels more comfortable putting her feelings for Alwyn into song, rather than talking about them in an interview.
“Singing about something helps you to express it in a way that feels more accurate,” Swift explained. “You cannot, no matter what, put words in a quote and have it move someone the same way as if you heard those words with the perfect sonic representation of that feeling.”
“There is that weird conflict in being a confessional songwriter and then also having my life, you know, 10 years ago, be catapulted into this strange pop-culture thing,” she added.
While she’s apparently happier than ever with Alwyn, Swift told Rolling Stone that she doesn’t feel like she needs to start drawing inspiration from other sources outside of her personal life.
“I don’t feel like that yet,” she said. “I think I might feel like that possibly when I have a family. If I have a family … I don’t know why I said that! But that’s what I’ve heard from other artists, that they were very protective of their personal life, so they had to draw inspiration from other things. But again, I don’t know why I said that. Because I don’t know how my life is going to go or what I’m going to do. But right now, I feel like it’s easier for me to write than it ever was.”
RELATED: Why Taylor Swift Says Her Relationship with Joe Alwyn ‘Isn’t Up for Discussion’
Besides Lover, Alwyn was also referenced in Swift’s 2017 album Reputation, which she refers to now as a “love story.”
“It was a love story in amongst chaos,” Swift told Rolling Stone of the record. “All the weaponized sort of metallic battle anthems were what was going on outside. That was the battle raging on that I could see from the windows, and then there was what was happening inside my world — my newly quiet, cozy world that was happening on my own terms for the first time … It’s weird, because in some of the worst times of my career, and reputation, dare I say, I had some of the most beautiful times — in my quiet life that I chose to have.”
Last month, a source told PEOPLE that Alwyn’s personality “is great for Taylor.”
“He is very calm and always very supportive,” the source said, adding, “He’s sympathetic and understanding and supports her speaking out about things that she doesn’t agree with.”
RELATED: Taylor Swift Isn’t Afraid to Speak Her Mind — and Boyfriend Joe Alwyn Is Fully Supportive: Source
“There’s something refreshing and different about their relationship. Joe makes Taylor very happy, and it’s hard to picture her not spending the rest of her life with him,” the insider continued. “Her family loves him. He seems older than he is and is a fantastic guy.”
The source added that both Swift and Alwyn are on the same page about keeping their relationship private.
“Joe loves acting but doesn’t want to be a celebrity. They both agree that, for their relationship to keep working, they want to keep things more quiet,” the source said. “She’s the happiest she’s ever been.”
